Wow... was thinking of buying the next gen Shield whenever it comes out (2022? 2023?). Not sure anymore.

Do they mean the large banner area now over the top row taking about a third of the display? I don't think there is anywhere else that has changed? TBH I don't mind it too much... to me its no different to the similar area in Netflix app telling you what new things are coming out. Right now for me I see a large ads for Disney+ which I do have, so it is relevant for me. One thing though is I normally get a notification of updates to Shield and have to say yes to install them... I don't seem to remember getting a recent update notification for this - it was just suddenly there a week or two ago... was it pushed automatically??

Isn't this the same interface as the Chromecast that runs Google TV?

Sideload Launcher Manager and a custom launcher like Wolf Launcher: https://www.techdoctoruk.com/launcher-manager-for-android-tv-fireos-6/ I despise ads…especially the random widgets scattered throughout my browser that are on a delayed load so as to shift the image right as I click on something causing me to mistakenly hit the ad. They’ve gone from a minor annoyance to kicking down my door, sitting on my couch and making out with my wife. I bought my 2 shield Pros to have full control over my tv experience and not have ad companies push their agenda onto me. The shield ads take up too much screen real estate and they are not relevant to what I watch, pushing things I don’t want to see. Turn off auto updates in google play, side load the apps I linked above or some other similar ones you like, and you’ll be able to toggle between launchers and not be violated by ads anymore.

IIllIlllII:

Sideload Launcher Manager and a custom launcher like Wolf Launcher: https://www.techdoctoruk.com/launcher-manager-for-android-tv-fireos-6/ I despise ads…especially the random widgets scattered throughout my browser that are on a delayed load so as to shift the image right as I click on something causing me to mistakenly hit the ad. They’ve gone from a minor annoyance to kicking down my door, sitting on my couch and making out with my wife. I bought my 2 shield Pros to have full control over my tv experience and not have ad companies push their agenda onto me. The shield ads take up too much screen real estate and they are not relevant to what I watch, pushing things I don’t want to see. Turn off auto updates in google play, side load the apps I linked above or some other similar ones you like, and you’ll be able to toggle between launchers and not be violated by ads anymore.

Just out of curiosity, do you retain 4k AI upscaling with the loader, or are there any other important things lost?

Yeah it's very rubbish, not a good update.

Airbud:

Well? did you?...:p

Not my kind of movie

heffeque:

Just out of curiosity, do you retain 4k AI upscaling with the loader, or are there any other important things lost?

Nothing lost yet. I watched a 4K GoT episode through Plex, and my Plex server wasn’t transcoding, and the shield properly processed it for my 1080p TV. I hope that NVidia doesn’t change this in a future patch to tie device features to something like the default launcher.

I personally don't give a rats a$$ if they change the interface with a few ads. Sure it sucks a little bit but it's not something that has crippled the unit. And from what I understand, I could be wrong, is it's google forceing Nvidia to use this new interface. So many Karens on the Geforce forum whining like it's a facemask. LOL

Oh crap, i didn't use Mi Box S 4k for a while and now after updates i see ads (recommendations) on it also. I was planning to get the new shield also when releases, i hope there is a way to avoid them.

There must be alot of freaking stupid people since the immense amounts of ads these days can pay off... personally i dont buy anything from ads, like any smart person wouldnt. And yeah, i hate that nvidia made an otherwise ad-free device another ad spam... but lets be real, nvidia doesnt give a flying fack what we think - they never have and they never will, as long as they get their $$$$...

Another product line bites the dust... An MBA just earned his devil horns.

heffeque:

Wow... was thinking of buying the next gen Shield whenever it comes out (2022? 2023?). Not sure anymore.

It's really not that big a deal unless you spend an inordinate amount of time staring at the launcher..... Once you launch an app, the ad banner is gone until you close the app.

Denial:

Isn't this the same interface as the Chromecast that runs Google TV?

No, it's slightly less irritating....but it's essentially the same UI that every AndroidTV/GoogleTV device is going to be required to use now.

Mr_ALLroy:

I personally don't give a rats a$$ if they change the interface with a few ads. Sure it sucks a little bit but it's not something that has crippled the unit. And from what I understand, I could be wrong, is it's google forceing Nvidia to use this new interface. So many Karens on the Geforce forum whining like it's a facemask. LOL

I'm right there with you. I saw the banner pop up for the first time a little over a week ago. I looked at it, said "well, that sucks" and went on with what I was doing. It's really not that big a deal. Noticeable? Sure. But it doesn't fundamentally change the device. It's still the best AndroidTV device on the market.

I have a 2015 ShieldTV (best device of the kind that I have owned) and I haven't been "blessed" with the launcher update yet. Lets be real here, the blame for this thing lies with Google not NVIDIA. Google controls the Android TV launcher app, NVIDIA is just the one who uses it on their devices (they may even be contractually obligated to use that launcher by default). From what I read, if you uninstall the updates to the launcher you get back to the original launcher that is part of the latest firmware. Then disable automatic app updates to keep it and manually update any of the other apps you use on the device. Whether Google will rollback the changes they made to the launcher or NVIDIA will switch to an alternative launcher still needs to be seen. There are alternative launchers that you can install if you really want to make sure that you are not drawn into this BS by Google. Though some of those are add supported as well.